There’s not a whole lot of creativity or originality when it comes to the way different people sit in a room.
People tend to use a room in the same way. They favor the same chairs and the same places. Choices are dictated by the unchanging features of the room like the placement of the bathroom, walls, the windows, where one would naturally set up a laptop to work, and the television.
Over time, this leads to wear and tear in some areas of the room more than others.
Sleep in a bed that’s been worn in this way can give you intense back pain. You won’t necessarily realize it until it’s too late.
Continual usage wears out furniture and people’s backs when it comes to beds, especially when it comes to mattresses that aren’t designed (or need to be) flipped.
If you’re not careful, you can end up exacerbating back pain from sleeping on a worn-out portion of a mattress.
Unless we pay attention to probable room usage patterns, we’ll probably end up doing the same thing as everyone else.
How to avoid it
The good thing is that avoiding back pain from overused areas of rented rooms is fairly easy.
All it takes is being aware of the tendency of people to use some areas more than others.
Ask yourself how most people would use the room. Where would they sit on the bed? Are there chairs that they’d sit on instead? How do people feel inclined to use the room?
Some rooms don’t have chairs that people would be likely to use to sit. They’re likely used to hang coats and pants on. Would the beds be used for sitting?
Sometimes, due to the placement of end tables and lamps, one side of the bed is likely to get a lot more wear than the others. Stay away from that side.
If you can, change the usage up. Move furniture. Sit on the floor. Whatever. With just a little awareness, you’ll be better off. Your back is one of the big keys to fitness and fitness is one of the big keys to good health. Sleeping on a bed like this for a few nights can avoid trips to the chiropractor, an emergency department, or having to take anti-inflammatory medication on a trip.
James Cobb, RN, MSN is the founder of the Dream Recovery System, one of the top sleep blogs on the Internet. The idea for this article came from a trip in which a rented room had no good chair to sit in. The natural usage pattern meant people sat on the left side of the bed to look out of a window with a beautiful view. The wear and tear on the mattress was invisible to the naked eye even if you pulled the sheets off and checked. Cobb woke up with intense back pain.
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